EDC 2012: A First-Timer Gets Deflowered

By Matt Oliver Mon., Jun. 11 2012 at 6:31 PM

Matt Oliver/OC Weekly

Armin Van Buuren puts EDC in a state of trance

I completed my night by taking pictures of Armin Van Buuren, Porter Robinson, Dada Life, David Guetta, Avicii, Flux Pavillion and Cazzette. Even though you might be able to see these DJs perform together at Ultra Music Festival in Miami, the production value is not even close. There is nothing like seeing Van Buuren performing "Not Giving Up On Love" as seven girls dressed as gigantic red flowers dance around him with blue fireworks going off. It was also inspiring to see 19-year-old Porter Robinson represent a new class of DJs, spinning tracks like "Language" while LED flames consumed the top of main stage. And as much as I usually want to puke every time I hear "Levels," the sound of 50,000 people screaming with passion, "Oh, oh sometimes, I get a good feeling, yeah!" during Avicii's surprise set is something that I will never forget.

To cap my EDC weekend, I sat on the lawn with some friends as the sun rose to watch Dany Tenagila playing on the Cosmic Meadow stage hosted by Carl Cox. I'm not a big fan of tech house, but Tenagila inspired me to picked up my feet and used the last gasp of energy left in my tank to dance my ass off as the sun came up.

As the masses climbed the bleachers along the race track to head home, deflowered EDC goers like myself no doubt have a memory of those three continuous nights permanently seared into their brain as they prepared to go back to school or work, or some variation of boring, everyday life. Of course you'll always have the mental pictures of the people you met, conversions you had and the kind, random kindness of strangers. And chances are there's a photo of you getting high as fuck still lingering inside somebody's cellphone.

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Tags:

Armin van Buuren, Avicii, David guetta, EDC 2012, EDM, Electric Daisy Carnival, Electric Daisy Carnival 2012, electronic dance music, Porter Robinson, Tiesto

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ertonyrn

Holy Moly! You are a "professional" writer? I could hardly read this due to the combination of run-on sentences, incorrect use of grammar, punctuation, and words in general. 1) "EDC 2012: An First timer..." (I see this was already corrected... "An First"?!). 2) Who is Goyte? 3) First pumping? 4) "quick heavy, bass" 5) "He was kinda enough to let me..." YIKES!

Jamesbrown

"I had a few negative assumptions about EDC when I first arrived. I imagined legions of half-naked E-tards bouncing around in the desert heat, first pumping to the same five songs over and over again, while meeting people that were only there to see the main stage headliners" You nailed it. That paragraph sums up America's obsession with electronic music. Quite sad, and laughable, really.

Theduke085

nice article buddy

EDC

Ya he missed Flux Pavilions performance he was definitely in the wrong place.

Alsilver

this article sucked. seriously. You should be ashamed it made it to print. Did you get your start with your friends 'underground 'zine'? I honestly don't believe you did anything worthwhile at the event. I am of the opinion that all you did was look at shit and think about telling people about what you did before it was even over. HOW ABOUT GETTING INVOLVED WITH SOMETHING NEXT TIME? Forever a spectator at a mass participation event. You would probably be the guy at Burning Man who never left his campsite but just tells everyone how cool he thinks everything is and how he can't wait to tell everybody back home. Dude. Ditch your friends, take that pill from that random hot girl, discover yourself and see how you react in new situations, and then MAYBE your writing will take itself to the next level.